holoride completes Hyundai’s ZER01NE Accelerator

holoride, the company advancing the future of in-vehicle entertainment, announced today its completion of Hyundai Motor Group’s ZER01NE Accelerator, an open innovation platform that facilitates collaboration among startups and Hyundai's internal teams in various business sectors.

The ZER01NE Accelerator discovers valued startups and develops strategic usage possibilities of their innovative technologies. holoride represents one of the European startups and was the only German startup to complete the accelerator program in 2021.

“Completing the ZER01NE Accelerator Program marked a critical step forward in bringing our in-car media technology to consumer vehicles this year,” said Nils Wollny, CEO and co-founder of holoride. “It was an honor working alongside the teams at Hyundai to complete the tech feasibility for our project, which was no small task given lockdowns and navigating setbacks due to the pandemic. This program allowed us to devote even more resources to developing holoride’s manufacturer-agnostic solution, and we’re extremely grateful for the opportunity.”

Founded in 2018, holoride addresses the need for in-vehicle media from a passenger's perspective. This is possible through merging extended reality (XR) content with real-time motion, location and navigational data from the car and its environment to transform transit time into a hyper-immersive experience. holoride’s solution can be tailored to meet the individual needs of different automotive partners. The result is a brand agnostic, scalable platform that unites car manufacturers, mobility providers and content creators to jointly conquer the in-car entertainment market and avoid fragmentation.

holoride worked closely with the Group and Hyundai CRADLE in Berlin to complete the ZER01NE Accelerator. Hyundai CRADLE is the Hyundai Innovation Center and Corporate Venture Capital. Its mission is to strengthen the Group's core mobility business and expand into new and adjacent markets to enhance transportation on and off the road. Target technologies include mobility services, smart cities, artificial intelligence (AI), renewable energy and robotics.

As the only German startup to be selected for the competitive program in 2020, holoride represents a growing number of European startups making waves in the global tech and automotive industries.

“It’s been an exciting journey to see holoride’s project for ZER01NE from start to finish,” said Edvin Eriksen, Head of Hyundai CRADLE Berlin. “holoride has the potential to shape not only in-car entertainment and gaming, but also the way we think about immersive formats for remote work and education. The global pandemic demonstrated the importance of flexible remote learning and productivity options that allow us to learn and work from anywhere — whether we’re in our homes or on the go.”

About Hyundai Motor Group

Hyundai Motor Group is a global enterprise that has created a value chain based on mobility, steel, and construction, as well as logistics, finance, IT, and service. With about 250,000 employees worldwide, the Group's mobility brands include Hyundai, Kia, and Genesis. Armed with creative thinking, cooperative communication and the will to take on any challenges, we strive to create a better future for all.

More information about Hyundai Motor Group, please see: www.hyundaimotorgroup.com

About holoride

holoride creates an entirely new media category for passengers by connecting Extended Reality (XR) content with data points from the vehicle in real time.

These data points include physical feedback, like acceleration and steering, traffic data, as well as travel route and time. holoride technology provides a new type of immersion into any kind of VR content, creating a breathtaking, immersive experience, and significantly reducing motion sickness. The tech startup was founded at the end of 2018 in Munich, Germany by Nils Wollny, Marcus Kuehne, Daniel Profendiner and Audi, who holds a minority stake in the startup.

In April 2021, holoride raised €10 million in its Series A funding round led by Terranet AB, earning the company a €30 million valuation. That same year, ​​holoride won the prestigious SXSW Pitch and was also named Best in Show. It has been hailed “Best of CES 2019” four times, recognized as one of the “100 Best Inventions of 2019” by TIME Magazine and is part of the global innovation platform “STARTUP AUTOBAHN powered by Plug and Play”.